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MR. DALLAS'S 



LETTER 



MEXICAN TREATY; 



RE-PRINTED FROM THE PUBLIC LEDGER 
June 15,H 



PHILADELPHIA: 

UNITED STATES BOOK AND JOB PRINTING ESTABLISHMENT, LEDGER BUILDING, 

1849. 



THOUGHTS 

ON 

MR. TRIST'S TREATY. 



[The gentleman to whom the following letter was addressed, having obtained the 
consent of his correspondent, has handed it to us for publication. It is valuable as a 
cotemporaneous and comprehensive view of the motives and features of our Treaty 
with Mexico. We believe this most able and interesting document will attract 
attention. The reader will be struck with observing, how, even in less than a year 
since its date, the shades of fact and opinion, so important to the truth of history, 
fade away. Its publication at this time makes it even more interesting than if 
published at the time of its date. We thank the correspondent of its author for 
selecting our paper as the channel for its publication.!^— ie^^er. 

My Dear Sir : — I cannot agree with your conclusion as to 
the doubtful effects of our treaties in general. It is hardly fair 
to say that we have been out-witted in the game of diplomacy. 
In truth, we have mostly attained what we aimed to attain, and 
have very seldom yielded to a proposition without being quite 
convinced that its operations would be beneficial to ourselves. 
Perhaps we have indulged too much eagerness for treaty- 
making — sometimes forcing artificial relations where nature 
never intended any to exist — sometimes deluded by theories of 
trade, and now and then impelled by a generous sentiment, or 
allured by a plausible profession. Like true Yankees, we have 
occasionally found delight in making a bargain, merely for 
bargaining's sake. Thus, during our seventy-two years of in- 
dependent existence, we have entered into no less than ninety- 
nine international contracts, exclusive of Indian ones ; and I 



will repeat to you, without stopping' to comment upon them, 
the names of the forty-one sovereignties with whom we have 
so contracted : 1, France ; 2, Great Britain ; 3, The Nether- 
lands; 4, Sweden; 5, Prussia; 6, Morocco; 7, Algiers; 8, 
Spain; 9, Tripoli; 10, Russia; 11, Tunis; 12, Columbia; 
13, Central America ; 14, Denmark ; 15, The Hanseatic Re- 
publics ; 16, Mexico; 17, Brazil; 18, Austria; 19, Ottoman 
Porte ; 20, Chili ; 21, The Two Sicilies ; 22, Siam ; 23, Mus- 
cat ; 24, Venezuela; 25, Peru; 26, Greece; 27, Texas; 28, 
Sardinia ; 29, Equador ; 30, Hanover ; 31, Portugal ; 32, New 
Grenada; 33, Wurtemburg; 34, China; 35, Belgium; 36, 
Nassau; 37, Switzerland; 38, Mecklenburg Schwerin ; 39, 
Oldenburg; 40, Bavaria; 41, Saxony. 

In asking my ^^ thoughts on the recent treaty of peace''^ 
with Mexico, you open upon me a wide field, and I cannot 
answer you without considerable detail ; whatever tediousness 
may follow, you must charge to your own indiscretion. 

Certainly a most important addition — perhaps the most im- 
portant since the revolutionary treaties — to the supreme law of 
the United States, was accomplished by that instrument. To 
conform with frankness and fidelity to its arrangements and 
stipulations, and at the same time to reap fully its advantages, 
are objects which will engage the reflections of our citizens, 
and which justify, if they do not imperatively exact, a calm 
consideration of its provisions and probable results. 

Springing, as our statutes generally do, out of the pre- 
dispositions and anterior discussions of the people, their char- 
acter and bearings are promptly appreciated. Not so with 
international conventions. These involve topics of exterior 
relations, impose new and unstudied duties, and open fresh 
fields for enterprise and industry ; all requiring candid, scru- 



pulous, and often laborious investigation. The public faith of 
our country — a gem of incalculable value — has never yet, with 
good cause, been questioned ; and to secure its unclouded pre- 
servation, it is necessary that we should perfectly understand 
and fulfil, as well in the spirit as in the letter, our positive 
national obligations. Nothing can be of more binding efficacy 
than a Treaty of Peace, and nothing calls for greater care of 
analysis and sterner integrity of construction. 

It may, I think, be correctly said that the circumstances 
which affect our intercourse with the one sister republic of this 
continent, are calculated to suggest the wisdom of more than 
common forbearance and caution of action. The temptations 
to treat her as an enfeebled inferior, to depreciate her civiliza- 
tion, to encroach upon her ill-guarded rights, and to apply the 
treasures which she so flagrantly mismanages — of her soil, her 
climate and her location — to the aims of our higher and pro- 
gressive intelligence, are constantly operating. The history of 
the world is full of proof that such temptations are apt to sap 
and overthrow the magnanimity and fame of a nation, and too 
often impel her into courses of usurpation, which never fail, 
ultimately, to re-act fatally upon her own institutions and 
safety. It is easy to see that the destinies of our Union are in 
a large degree to be influenced by the proximity and our 
treatment of Mexico. Let us be vigilant — not over her, for 
she is irremediably powerless — but over ourselves, as a people 
and a government, that, unseduced by the consciousness of 
irresistible strength, we may never transcend the limits of 
justice and honor. 

On the 15tli of April, 1847, Mr. Nicholas P. Trist, then the 

Chief Clerk in the Department of Sfate, at "Washington, was 

duly authorized and instructed to proceed, as a Commissioner, 
1* 



to the United Mexican States, to the head-quarters of our army, 
and to act " as a confidential agent, fully acquainted with the 
views of his government, and clothed with full power to con- 
clude a Treaty of Peace." 

It will be recollected that, at this date, the war was not yet 
a year old — taking as its first actual opening the surprise upon 
Capt. Thornton's party of dragoons, on the 16th of April, 1846. 
The appointment of Mr. Trist had, notwithstanding, been pre- 
ceded by a series of battles, from Palo Alto to the eve of Cero 
Gordo, by which the vast and overpowering ascendancy of the 
American armies, under any disproportion of numbers, was in- 
contestably established. His mission, though impeded by mis- 
apprehensions, repelled by an obstinate enemy, and closed by 
a recall, was, nevertheless, with a rare vigor of will and as- 
sumption of responsibility, persevered in, until the capital of 
our enemy being occupied by our forces, the instrument now 
under consideration was, in its original form, signed by its re- 
spective negotiators, on the 2d of February, 1848, at the city 
of Guadaloupe Hidalgo. 

A record of such solemnity — so momentous in its immediate 
and its remote consequences to two nations, was never fashion- 
ed in a manner more irregular and strange. It can scarcely 
be assumed that either of the persons by whom it was concocted, 
on one side or the other, had legally the proper representative 
capacity to act. Mr. Trist certainly had been divested of all 
public function, and of this fact his Mexican co-laborers were 
as perfectly aware, as that their own commissions wanted con- 
stitutional foundation. The case became an individual expe- 
riment of spontaneous diplomacy : and, of course, past instruc- 
tions received attention-only so far as they did not impede the 
progress of adjustment. This production naturally invoked 



attack, criticism, ridicule — it was despised as a mere piece of 
paper; and was alleged to begin and end (in reference to the 
recitals of powers) with plain blunt falsehood. Notwithstand- 
ing all this, the document rapidly found its way to the American 
Executive ; in three weeks only after its completion, it had 
traversed some thousands of miles, and was submitted to the 
Senate of the United States for ratification ; and on the lapse of 
two weeks more, it was, with very few changes, invested with 
all the sanctions of national adoption. Subsequently confirmed 
by the Mexican authorities, and its ratifications exchanged on 
the 30th of May, 1848, it has ceased to be "a mere piece of 
paper," and no longer imports an untruth; but solemnly 
vouched and guarantied by the joint honor and faith of both 
countries, it is now and forever, henceforward, "A Treaty of 
Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United 
States of America and the Mexican Republic.'' 

Before proceeding to comment upon the treaty as it stands, 
it may be useful briefly to advert to those portions of it which 
failed to obtain the assent of our Government. Some light, 
indeed, will be shed, by this course, upon our future inquiries, 
aiding to develop more precisely the purposes of the contract- 
ing parties with the hopes and fears by which they were re- 
spectively animated. 

Two entire articles of the instrument, as transmitted from 
Mexico, were unhesitatingly rejected by the Senators. The 
President, in his message communicating it, had expressed his 
decided repugnance to both of them. The first (which was 
article tenth,) bore a very equivocal aspect, and found no war- 
rant in any instruction from our Department of State. It 
savored strongly of private speculating interest, intruding itself, 
covertly, if not corruptly, into the national arrangement. Its real 



8 

object was to pledge the United States to cause to be recognized 
as valid in the subsequent fulfilment of their conditions an un- 
defined extent of grants made by Mexico of lands in Texas, 
as they would have been valid had Texas never achieved her 
independence. Such a proposition was inadmissible, in refer- 
ence alike to the sovereignty and rights of Texas, and to the 
consitutional range of the treaty-making power. It could not 
be entertained without insulting Texas, by affecting to inter- 
meddle with her titles to her own property. Nor could it be 
entertained without unsettling the terms of annexation upon 
which she had been admitted into the Union. Texas had be- 
come a member of our confederacy by promptly and frankly 
embracing the first and second sections of the joint resolution 
passed by Congress on the 1st of March, 1845 : and in these 
it was expressly stipulated that she should " retain all the pub- 
lic funds, debts, taxes, and dues of every kind which may be- 
long to, or be due and owing said republic ; and all the vacant 
and unappropriated lands lying within her limits." Nothing 
but a scheme originating with the holders of bad titles, in or- 
der to enhance the value of their grants, can well account for 
the introduction of this instantly repudiated article. Its real 
bearing must have eluded the sagacity of our negotiator. 

The other entire rejection was of "an additional and secret 
article.^' The twenty-third article of the treaty itself provided 
that an exchange of ratifications should take place in four 
months from the date of the signatures — this secret article, con- 
templating the peculiar circumstances in which the Mexican 
Republic was placed, extended the four to eight months. 

In all our intercourse with the Government of Mexico, that 
of which we have had most reason to complain is, an ha- 
bitual resort to procrastination and duplicity. To gain time, 



and to seize the possible advantages of delay, seem perpetual 
aims with its diplomacy. It has no sincerity and no fixedness. 
A compound of Spanish gravity and Indian wiliness, it exhibits 
an equal distrust of others and of itself. To act justly for the 
sake of justice ; to do what is right, because it is right ; to re- 
deem promises with honorable exactness ; and to construct 
peace and prosperity upon foundations of good faith ; these 
are not principles or notions to which Mexican intelligence 
and experience have yet elevated their foreign policy. If they 
have earned the epithet of barbarous, it is by no trait of charac- 
ter more justly than the one thus described. 

The secret article only added to a series, exhibited during 
the last ten years, and especially in the progress of the war, a 
further illustration of this spirit of craft and instability. Four 
months were amply sufficient for perfecting the peace, if its 
inclination existed. Why then protract them to eight 7 Was 
it to prolong the opportunity for realizing some lingering hopes 
of European intervention 1 Was it to await the full develop- 
ment of an anticipated dissension among ourselves, respecting 
the continuance of the war, and the extension of our territories ? 
Was it to retard the withdrawal of our forces to the sicfciy 
season ? Was it to attempt another organization of their scat- 
tered army, like that effected during the armistice 1 Was it, 
in fine, to keep the chapter of accidents open, with a design, 
on any change of fortune, to find pretexts for withholding, ul- 
timately, a ratification ? Whatever prompted the dilatory ex- 
pedient, it failed. 

On the part of the United States, there was every reason for 
insisting that the subject should be brought to a definite close 
at the earliest practicable day. They had incurred a heavy 
expenditure in efiecting their conquest: their treasury was 



10 

not perceptibly relieved by the system of military contribution ; 
and to keep their victorious armies in the heart of Mexico, 
waiting, under all the hazards of idleness and demoralization, 
merely to gratify an aifected convenience of their enemy, was 
rather more than could reasonably be expected from either 
their generosity or their solicitude for peace. The American 
people had very generally come to the determination that the 
struggle should cease, and cease at once ; whether by a pacifi- 
cation, or a permanent occupation, they left to the choice of 
the subdued. 

Dissected by the Senate, other parts of the original treaty 
shared the fate of its tenth and secret articles. 

1. An elaborate and seemingly anxious provision was de- 
signed, to obtain from the Government of the United States a 
special guaranty of all ecclesiastic and religious corporations 
or communities, in the ceded territories of New Mexico and 
California, as well in the discharge of the offices of their 
ministry as in the enjoyment of all their temples, houses and 
edifices dedicated to the Roman Catholic worship, and in all 
property destined to its support, or to that of schools, hospitals 
and other foundations for charitable or beneficent purposes ; 
and, also, a guaranty that the relations and communications 
between the Catholics in those territories and their respective 
ecclesiastical authorities, should be free from all hindrance, 
even though such authorities should reside within the limits of 
the Mexican Republic — a freedom to continue so long as a new 
demarcation of ecclesiastical districts should not have been 
made, conformably to the laws of the Roman Catholic church. 

The hierarchy in Mexico, a separate and wealthy power in 
the State, upon seeing that it had become necessary to save the 
nationality of their country, by relinquishing, in the form of a 



11 



sale, all claims to the provinces already occupied as conquered, 
would naturally strive, by conditions, to protect such of their 
affiliated brethren as remained there in the uninterrupted ex- 
ercise of a preferred faith and spiritual co-operation. This 
war, like all others, had been accompanied by exasperating 
representations from each side, as to the objects and conduct of 
the adversary. In order to stir up the deepest feelings of hostility 
to us, and at the same time to induce the church to volunteer 
her riches and her prayers to repel the invaders, the American 
people were charged with having entered upon a crusade 
against the Catholicism of Mexico, and with aiming to discredit 
and disperse its priesthood, as well as to plunder and raze the 
temples dedicated to its worship. Nothing could be more 
absolutely false, and yet nothing, for a season, seemed so 
likely to debase the contest with the fury of intolerance, 
assassination and cruelty. The highly discreet and honorable 
deportment, in this respect, which marked the progress of our 
forces, as well officers as men, ought to have dispelled all 
apprehension long before the negotiation for a treaty began. 

I will here take occasion to assert that no armies ever over- 
ran an enemy's country with so strict and uniform attention 
to the rules of civilized warfare, as did ours, in all their great 
campaigns under Taylor, Scott, Kearney, Wool, or Donophan. 
History will delineate this as their noble characteristic, in con- 
trast with the practices of European belligerents. No licen- 
tious and brutal soldiery went riot under the American flag- 
no towns or villages were sacked— no cities were plundered or 
fired— no unnecessary carnage stained the fiercest fight— no 
wanton oppression followed upon victory— no spoils were 
hoarded— no galleries of art were rifled— no monuments were 
mutilated or removed— no debts left unpaid. Narratives like 



12 



those which have recorded the military excesses of France, 
England and Russia, in Egypt, or Italy or Spain, or Circassia' 
or Poland, or Algeria, can never be written to degrade our re- 
publican combatants. Still, after the groundless alarm had 
once been excited, it could hardly surprise us, that a Roman 
Catholic clergy should suggest some protective stipulations 
like this, on behalf of those from whom they were about to 
separate politically forever. It can more fairly be ascribed to 
affectionate solicitude than to bigotted cunning. The plain 
truth is, that the most enlightened Mexicans fail to compre- 
hend or appreciate the theory and action of our system as re- 
gards the freedom of divine worship-and it was exactly this 
which they do not understand, which renders it impossible for 
our Government to subscribe to a proposed contract for guard- 
ing ecclesiastical immunities or relations. Our Government 
might, perhaps, innocently guaranty, as has been heretofore 
done, in treaties with at least sixteen different countries, the 
most perfect security and liberty of conscience, and entire ex- 
emption from disturbance or molestation on account of religion, 
to the inhabitants of the ceded provinces. Mr. Joel Barlow,' 
in the treaty he effected with the Bey of Tripoli, diplomati- 
cally asserted that -the Government of the United States 
of America is not founded on the Christian Religion.'' Mr. 
Tobias Lear, in a subsequent treaty with the same power, says 
more gently, that -the Government of the United States of 
America has, in itself, no character of enmity/ against the 
laws, religion, or tranquillity of Mussulmans ;^' and Mr Wm 
Shaler, in a still later one with the Dey of Algiers, with greater 
comprehensiveness, affirms, that -the Government of the United ' 
States has, in itself, no character of enmity against the laros ' 
religion, or tranquillity of any nation.- There is incontestable 



13 

truth in each and all of these representations, however widely 
construed. The constitutional injunction, that ^'•Congress shall 
make no laio respecting an establishment of religioji,'' can- 
not be too scrupulously complied with. Indeed, had not ex- 
perience taught us that it is impossible, with any labor of ex- 
planation, to infuse into foreign governments an exact sense of 
the spirit and complexity of our institutions, I should consider 
it more consistent and more safe, sternly to refrain from even 
mentioning in national pacts a subject so expressly and con- 
fessedly out of the reach of federal legislation or control. Its 
introduction is certainly somewhat disingenuous, and, by cre- 
ating erroneous impressions as to the national jurisdiction, 
might, under circumstances, bring our public faith into question. 
With us, religious and spiritual allegiance is, as such, a matter 
essentially extra-political — as wholly intangible by legislation 
or diplomacy, as private thought. 

2. The paragraph on which I have just commented, having 
been struck from the original document, the one that pre- 
ceded it was winnoioed and changed, until it became the short 
but ample Article IX, of the Treaty, as ratified. 

It had provided that the people of California and New Mex- 
ico should, in the first place, be incorporated into the Union, 
and admitted to the enjoyment of all the rights of citizens of 
the United States, as soon as possible, according to the prin- 
ciples of the Federal Constitution : and in the second place, 
that they should, in the meantime, enjoy the civil rights now 
vested in them by Mexican laws, and that their political rights 
should be equal to those of the inhabitants of our other terri- 
tories ; at least not inferior to those of the inhabitants of Loui- 
siana and Florida, when acquried from France and Spain. 

The adding of another member to the American Confederacy, 
2 



14 

pregnant as that proceeding is with vast consequences to those 
already comprising it, is a matter of congressional discretion. 
It may or it may not be done, as a majority should happen to 
esteem it wise and expedient, or the reverse. No amount of 
population, and no period of probation are prescribed as neces- 
sary preliminaries. The language of the Constitution is 
simply — "NeiD States may be admitted by the Congress into 
this Union."" A State can be composed of five thousand, or 
five hundred thousand; of a foreign, superstitious, indolent, 
and many colored people, or of known, enlightened, laborious, 
and pale-hued Saxons ; of men to whom our laws and usages 
are sudden novelties ; or of men whose habits of thought and 
action have been moulded beneath their administration. The 
discretion of Congress must be governed by a full considera- 
tion of these various circumstances ; and the hour of admis- 
sion expedited, or retarded, as may seem best to that body. 
The form of this stipulation for incorporation into our Union, 
was obviously found in the treaty purchases of Louisiana and 
Florida : and had there not been supposed to exist in Califor- 
nia and New Mexico a mass of population, exercising all the 
rights of citizenship, and yet greatly inferior to any received 
with those prior cessions, perhaps that form, having been tested 
by time, would have escaped criticism and change. An en- 
gagement, however, to welcome into this confederacy, as equal 
political brethren, and as soon as possible^ hordes of ignorant, 
degraded, tawny, black, brown, and semi-barbarous beings, 
was too repulsive to be directly embraced : and it was avoided 
by substituting for the words of hot haste, the cool phrase, "a^ 
the proper time, {to be judged of by the Congress of the 
United States") 
To be vainglorious seems a common propensity of nations. 



15 

The Egyptians, Jews, Greeks, Spaniards, English, French, 
Chinese, aye and Turks, have, in succession, flattered them- 
selves with the belief that they held the palm of pre-eminent 
civilization, and have arrogantly applied the term ^^Barba- 
rians" to others. The manner in which we are prone to 
speak of our Mexican neighbors, indicates no unwillingness 
to follow this bad example. Our language of contempt is 
wholesale and unmeasured. In all things in which they 
differ from us, we set them down as deficient, rude, or vicious. 
They, at least, are our " Barbarians" — lower, perhaps, in the 
scale of humanity than some tribes of western Indians, though 
hardly as low as the creeping and cadaverous " root-diggers." 
I am not disposed to controvert what is so palpably unjust, un- 
charitable, undiscriminating and impolitic. But this I will 
say : that if there be, and of that I entertain no doubt, an 
elevating and improving principle in our admirable structure 
of government, these miserable Mexicans, so long the vic- 
tims of all sorts of misrule, are the very objects whom we 
should hasten to embrace within the circle of its regenerating 
influence. I suppose we cannot, in the high spheres of politi- 
cal action, invoke, even as illustrations of the true philosophy 
of life, the individual examples of a Howard among the sufier- 
ing, or a Dix among the insane — governments shrink from 
the ridicule of propagandism or knight-errantry — but surely 
our sublimated excellence need fear no contamination with 
this other race of God's creatures, and may fairly hope to find 
them, as incoming partners, speedily imitating the successful 
habits of the old firm. 

3. The instrument as sent from Guadalonpe Hidalgo, re- 
served to the Mexican Government the right to determine, 
when her ratification was given, in which of the two described 



16 

modes the United States should pay the prices of the ceded 
provinces, to wit, fifteen millions of dollars. 

Both modes required a payment of three millions of dollars, 
immediately after the treaty should have been duly ratified by 
the government of the Mexican Republic, at the city of Mex- 
ico, and in the gold or silver coin of Mexico. For the remain- 
ing twelve millions of dollars, the first mode proposed the 
creation of a United States stock, bearing an annual interest of 
six per cent., payable at Washington, redeemable at any time 
after the expiration of two years ; of which stock transferable 
certificates, in such sums respectively as the Mexican Govern- 
ment might specify, were to he forthioith delivered to that Go- 
vernment : and the second mode proposed the payment at 
Mexico, and in Mexican coin, in four annual instalments, of 
three millions each, with interest at the rate of six per cent. — 
the first instalment and its interest to be paid at the expiration 
of one year from the ratification of the treaty by Mexico. The 
reservation of the liberty of choice between these modes of 
payment, and all that related to the first mode, were stricken 
out of the treaty by the Senate. 

To the Treasury of the United States it was a matter of 
indifference which of these plans prevailed : but to the security 
of the objects which our Government had in view, one of them 
afibrded, indirectly, greater aid than the other. 

The Mexican administration with whom Mr. Trist negoti- 
ated, was surrounded by difficulties, and its duration exceed- 
ingly doubtful. No confidence prevailed that it could perse- 
vere in the policy of peace, opposed by a numerous and 
patriotic party, cherishing war as the only means of over- 
throwing established practices of misgovernment, and of ulti- 
mately merging their nationality into ours. Its great want 



17 

was money : for without that, how invigorate adherents, or 
retain dependents ? Its credit and means were paralyzed, ex- 
hausted, or in the grasp of the conqueror. The prompt receipt 
of these three millions from the United States would enable it 
perhaps, on the first shock of peace, if I may so express myself, 
to stand firm, keep order, and outlive the crisis : but such a 
sum could scarcely entrench it safely and durably against the 
threatened assaults of its adversaries, or ward off an almost 
immediate recurrence of the contest. Twelve additional mil- 
lions, paid in a form convertible into cash, and at once avail- 
able, might sufiice for every object : and they were naturally, 
therefore, sought by Pen a y Pena. 

With us, the course of prudent expediency was different. 
Whatever, on the close of the war, might be the issue of the 
struggle between rival factions in the Mexican Republic, 
whether the management of her affairs passed into new and 
less amicably disposed hands or not, we had it in our power 
so to distribute and withhold our payments, as to make them 
fulfil the purpose of an impressive recognizance to be of good 
behavior during at least Jive years. That government^ how 
much soever its chiefs might change, could not be insensible 
to the danger of losing, by any rupture of the treaty, the in- 
stalments remaining due. And as this consideration must 
affect the central policy, time would be gained to assuage the 
wounded sensibility and vindictiveness of the people, by the 
gradual influences of revived trade and intercourse. No doubt, 
as we were able, so we should be perfectly justified to retain 
by force, in despite of all future claim and aggression, the 
territories in part paid for by the three millions ; but it was de- 
sirable to sheathe the sword, with a reasonable confidence that 

it need not again be drawn. We wished, at all events, to aug- 
2* 



18 

ment the probability that when we disbanded our military 
levies, we should not be obliofed soon and suddenly to reorgan- 
ize others and repeat our conquests. 

As I have drawn too heavily upon your patience already, 
respecting the rejected portions of the original treaty, I abstain 
from noticing two or three other points of no great importance, 
and will now proceed to consider the instrument as it actually 
binds both countries. 

My remarks will, perhaps, assume greater perspicuity if ar- 
ranged under the two titles by which they are particularly 
suggested, such as 1, Peace, and 2, Boundary ; and as to 
both, they shall be as brief and comprehensive as I can make 
them. 

I, PEACE. 

It is not easy to determine in what precise light posterity 
will regard this peace— whether as a purchased or a conquered 
peace. Certainly it could never have been effected, had we 
not, by a succession of victories at all quarters, annihilated the 
military power of Mexico — making her statesmen almost de- 
spair of rescuing from extinction the nationality of their 
country. But with equal certainty, a dogged and infatuated 
obstinacy, combining with the ulterior policy of an annexation 
party, would have drawn us into the necessity of systematic 
and permanent subjugation, had we been unable or unwilling 
to replenish the empty treasury of Anaya with the price of the 
ceded Territories. 

Nor is it, as respects the point of national character, of any 
real importance towards which aspect of the matter the judg- 
ment of the world ultimately may incline. The superiority 
of our arms was unquestionable ; and if we did not, as was 
emphatically promised, conquer the peace, we certainly con- 



19 

quered our enemy whenever and wherever confronted. The 
country, the whole country, its cities, its seaports, its popula- 
tion, resources and wealth, were at our mercy. If we made a 
purchase, it was clearly not in order to deprecate any possible 
reverse, but to obtain a title to our territorial acquisitions, by 
express contract, (as did William Penn,) in preference to the 
one by belligerent capture. Such a muniment of property is 
in better harmony than that of forcible seizure, with the spirit, 
reasoning and professions of our republican system. Besides, 
the generous sentiment of the American people recoiled from 
the arrogant attitude of extorting from prostrated foes, at the 
point of the bayonet, what they could be induced, by persua- 
sive representations and a fair equivalent, voluntarily to surren- 
der. Peace was in itself a coveted blessing, but it could neither 
be durable nor welcome without indemnity ; and that indem- 
nity it was out of the power of Mexico even plausibly to 
promise, much less to pay, except by abating the price of lands, 
which, in her feeble and receding condition, were worthless, 
but, in our strong and advancing one, were of immense pro- 
spective value. We had found no reparation for countless 
j^gressions, in shedding torrents of Mexican blood, in sacri- 
ficing many thousands of our own brave citizens, or spending 
a vast amount of treasure. If redress were essential, and 
assuredly it could not be waived without making a mockery of 
public interests and trusts, the wit of man could devise no 
other means of obtaining it, equally gentle, equally convenient, 
and equally honorable. 

The Peace, whether conquered or purchased, must be re- 
garded as an illustration of American magnanimity. What 
other government, under the same circumstances, would have 
made if? What other people would have halted in the hour 



20 

of consummate triumph, and, amid the temptations of a rich 
and splendid Capital, a beautiful and abundant valley, a luxu- 
rious climate, the vegetation and tints of perpetual summer — 
have instantly shut their hearts against ambitious aspirations, 
and stretched forth their hands to renew the relations of amity ? 
I recollect no similar instance in the whole current of history, 
ancient or modern. Such a course always has been, and al- 
ways will be, contemptuously sneered at by monarchies : and 
past republics, even the generous one of Rome, have left no 
record of an example which we might be supposed to have 
copied. Traceable equally to the lofty and temperate character 
of our citizens, and to the beneficent character of our institu- 
tions, it is peculiarly and wholly an American act. If the 
peace be questionable, as showing an absence of forecasting 
energy — of that statesmanship which seizes Time by the fore- 
lock, and forces him to reap at once the harvest of half a cen- 
tury — it at least will remain a monument of self-denying 
virtue. 

There is, undoubtedly, an attraction in the word — " Peace !" 
and to that we have often heretofore yielded ; on some occasions, 
with more than judicious readiness. At Ghent, in 1815, it was 
powerful enough to induce a seemingly entire oblivion of the 
great cause of seamen's rights, which less than three years be- 
fore had provoked the declaration of war against Great Britain. 
In 1842 it allured us into a surrender of territory and a silence 
on pending reclamations, rather than permit Lord Ashburton 
to return to his Court unsuccessful and angry. And, fasci- 
nated by its seductive charms in 1846, we forgot, like faithless 
lovers, our solemn vows and protestations to Northern Oregon. 
We may possibly discover it to be wise and prudent sometimes 
to resist, as did President Jackson, respecting the French In- 



21 

demnity, in 1835, this Circean spell : and I must confess, that 
the peace with Mexico would be more satisfactory to a reflect- 
ing judgment, were the prospects of domestic government and 
of foreign intrusion in that country less unpromising than they 
actually are. Shall we admit no reproaches and no regrets, if 
she sink, the victim of savage anarchy, or more savage military 
despotism 1 Should the scion of some stump of royalty, as a 
ward of European policy and power, bent upon inoculating this 
continent with their degrading and pernicious system, be sent 
and accepted to her Chief Magistracy, mJght not a tardy and 
vain repentance follow, as 

Earth felt the wound — and Nature from her seat, 
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of wo, 
That all was lost ! 

No calamity, no sacrifice, no expenditure, no war, pestilence 
and famine could entail upon us and our posterity a hundredth 
part of the evil and inevitable consequences which must flow 
from fastening a kingly throne, by means of holy alliances, in 
American soil. The struggle between the fundamental and 
antagonistic principles of human association would at once be 
transferred from the eastern hemisphere, where, for ages, and 
over myriads, it has rioted in blood, pauperism, oppression, 
bigotry and ignorance. It would have been better to expunge 
the name of Mexico from the map forever. Her people have 
an indisputable right to choose their own form of government, 
regardless of advice, expostulation, or example; and if misled 
by corrupted chiefs, or by servile inclinations, they once stoop 
their backs to receive a regal rider, we may never cease to de- 
plore, in sackcloth and ashes, on their account, as well as our 
own, the fatal magnanimity of this peace. 

I have remarked, though without surprise, how few and 



22 

spiritless were the manifestations of rejoicing which greeted 
the proclamation announcing the war to be over. Here and 
there a faint illumination shone upon a quiet city crowd. Offi- 
cial guns, within their spheres of discipline, were ceremoni- 
ously and punctually discharged. A formulary of thanksgiv- 
ing passed languidly from pulpit to pulpit. And even the mer- 
cury of newspapers scarcely seemed to rise in their columns. 
This singular indifference to a great event finds much expla- 
nation in three facts — the war had very slightly disturbed the 
business of our country, for the attempt to infest the seas 
proved entirely abortive ; no anxiety as to invasion or inroad 
had anywhere been created; and our relations with Mexico 
involved the feelings and interests of comparatively a small 
class of our citizens. How differently was welcomed the peace 
with England ! and yet that peace did not crown as glorious a 
contest, was not prescribed in the enemy's Capital, and did not 
consummate a single aim of national policy ! Why is this ? 
Alas ! I forbear to speak of the power exerted over Americans 
by the oligarchy, literature, trade, stocks, and even fashions of 
our Anglo-Saxon rivals and revilers. It disables us from ap- 
preciating anything so highly as fraternity with England, any- 
thing so afflicting as quarrel with her. We can scarcely yet 
claim to have achieved our moral independence of the ^^mother 
country." 

II. BOUNDARY. 

The boundary of the treaty is, throughout, an imaginary 
line, and, as such, is certainly not the best that could be 
established between the nations. Starting in the waters of the 
Gulf of Mexico, at a point three leagues east of the mouth of 
the Bravo del Norte, it runs west and northwest, into and up 
the centre of the main channel of that river, until it strikes the 



23 

southern boundary of New Mexico ; then turns due west along 
that southern boundary, and continues identical with it, over the 
Sierra Mimbres, to its extreme western point, when it encoun- 
ters and adheres to the western boundary of New Mexico, run- 
ning north for about one degree and a half, within forty 
minutes of the 34th degree of north latitude, where it meets 
the first branch of the river Gila, when it turns to the centre 
of that stream, follows it down, inclining southwestwardly, to 
its confluence with the Colorado, crosses, in a straight line, the 
Colorado, and pursues its way, direct west, to a point on the 
Pacific Ocean, one league south of the city of San Diego, and 
about latitude 32 degrees 40 minutes. By this delineation, it 
will be perceived that there is expressly incorporated into the 
territorial area of the United States all the disputed portions of 
Texas, all new Mexico, and all, save only the southwestern 
corner, of Upper California. 

The purposes of peaceful separation are most surely and 
conveniently attained by mountainous barriers. Terminus is 
a god of forbearance and repose. He loves a lofty and lonely 
residence, one from which he can enjoy a wide horizon, and 
be sure of undisturbed tranquillity. He is unhappy amid the 
noisy throngs that bustle in plains or in valleys — and he is 
kept in feverish solicitude by the facility with which, if his 
home be built on water, he can be invaded on every side. The 
world's experience is full of this moral. The Alps, the Pyren- 
nees, the Balken, and the Andes may be scaled, it is true, by 
eagles, in unfrequent flights ; but the Rhine, the Danube, and 
the Vistula are skimmed unceasingly, to and fro, by lawless 
skiffs, freighted with smugglers or brigands. The case of the 
Caroline, on the St. Lawrence, is a memorable and painful 
illustration in our own story. 



24 

This boundary stretches through a vast length of unre- 
claimed wilderness, tenanted chiefly by tribes of fierce and 
roaming Indians. Henceforward we must control the savages 
North of it, and prevent their predatory incursions upon Mexi- 
co. The obligation to do so has been voluntarily assumed, 
. and, at any cost, must be fulfilled. And yet a smooth, ideal 
water-mark offers no let to the steed of a Camanche, an Apache, 
or a Navahoe. Indeed, it may be said that the ease with which 
such a limit is overleaped acts as a temptation to marauding 
parties to go into the foreign jurisdiction for their booty. 

The same precautions, it is true, which we shall have to take 
in order to protect our possessions from invasion by Mexicans, 
may be available as restraints upon our own Indians. A con- 
tinuous and communicating series of fortified posts will 
perform the double duty. The standing annual expense 
cannot, however, fail to be great, and clearly must be much 
greater than it would have been were the boundary better 
chosen. Had its track been upon the summits of the Sierra 
Madre, nature would have furnished the two countries a 
guaranty almost superseding the necessity of military supervi- 
sion. Indeed, I have thought this last mentioned line to be 
the one on which both Republics, in a spirit neither of grasping 
encroachment nor of timid surrender, but of wise forecast, 
should have agreed, as the obvious topographical bulwark of 
their mutual peace, friendship, and separate political and social 
rights. The hair-streak in the middle of the Bravo and the 
Gila may snap asunder at every swell of population or of 
passion, but the rugged chain of inaccessible heights would 
withstand every thing of this sort for many centuries, if not 
forever. 

By this adjustment of boundary, the superficial extent of 



25 

our accession of territory is large, and its value, when fully 
explored, may be found to exceed its price a hundred-fold. 
Without including the contested soil of Texas, (which tve are 
bound to regard as made incontestable by her own assertion of 
independence,) the treaty assigns to the United States more 
than five hundred and twenty-six thousand square miles of 
new land, or something short of three hundred and thirty-seven 
millions of acres — that is to say, a surface more than four 
times the size of England, Scotland and Ireland put together 
and considerably exceeding the joint areas of France, Spain, 
England, Portugal and Holland. Our country, by this an- 
nexation, becomes nearly as extensive as entire Europe. 

Of the actual worth of these immense regions, it is not easy 
and scarcely useful to venture an estimate, notwithstanding 
the floods of light shed upon them by explorers and travellers 
within the last five or six years. No one can reasonably doubt 
that they are fitted to become the seats of civilization, intelli- 
gence and freedom — of busy, agricultural, trading and happy 
communities. We may claim, without much presumption, 
for ourselves and our descendants, the ability to bring about 
such a result, more rapidly and prosperously than could any 
other of the races of men. All the fundamental materials of 
climate, soil, water, vegetation, stone and ore await there the 
plastic powers of industry, order and law. Nature, to be sure, 
in many parts, wears features of harshness, as well as gran- 
deur — mountainous ranges, capped with eternal snows, dark 
and craggy gorges, sterile wastes, protracted droughts and tem- 
pestuous floods — aspects common to Switzerland, Norway, 
Scotland, Circassia and Palestine. But there, also, are broad 
valleys, luxuriant with fruits, grain, flowers and pasturage — 

noble forests — copious and teeming rivers — and other charac- 
3 



26 

teristics of the most cherished lands. To found and foster a 
series of Commonwealths from the centre to the Western 
coasts of this continent — to be the parent, as it were, of a 
boundless, countless and exulting population, inhabiting to all 
futurity a domain first rescued from savage solitude by our own 
generation, is, as it would seem to me, an aim so magnificent 
as well as philanthropic and Christian, as to make almost con- 
temptible the inquiry into present positive value. 

We must remember that value is essentially the product of 
labor, and that few things in their rough and naiive conditions, 
apart from their susceptibility to improvement, are much to be 
prized. The wilderness, however, must be desolate beyond 
all example, which American pioneers will not rapidly open to 
sunshine and settlement. The value of New Mexico and 
California is not to be judged simply by their own inherent 
qualities. We must take also into consideration their adapta- 
bility, as spheres of action, to powers, habits and tastes, which 
we know ourselves to possess. If Providence, in shaping the 
characteristics of our people, has placed in their hands the ap- 
propriate talisman, they have but to advance in order to dispel 
the desert and turn solitude into song. And is it not so 1 As yet, 
unspoiled by luxury, their heads, hands and hearts are acute, 
hardy and firm enough, to repeat in the coming century, if not 
to double, their wonderful progress in the one just elapsed. 
While we look at Ohio, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Wis- 
consin, Florida and Arkansas, is it possible to question the in- 
vestment in the raw material of our new empire, or to doubt 
its early working out the most precious of all profits, free and 
flourishing States ? 

To such of our fellow-citizens who view with discontent the 
enlargement of our territory, it may be some consolation, that 



27 

this treaty emphatically provides against farther extension 
South. No change is ever to4De made in this boundary, " except 
by the express and//-ee consent of both iiations, laiufuUy given 
hy the general government of each, in conformity with its 
own constitution." The stipulation is stringent and unequivo- 
cal. Its covert allusion to the annexation of Texas cannot be 
mistaken — and it is an inviolable pledge by both contracting 
parties that such a case shall never be again enacted. Tamau- 
lipas. New Leon, Coahuila, Chihuahua, Sonora, Lower Cali- 
fornia, may separately or together achieve independence — but, 
without the positive and constitutional sanction of the central 
authorities in Mexico, not one of them can be admitted into 
our Union, except by manifest breach of faith. The general 
principles and practices under the laws of nations, to which 
we so justly appealed, in vindication of our course as to Texas, 
are henceforward, as between the American and Mexican con- 
federacies, specially modified and restricted. How far it was 
either prudent or politic on our part to do this, has ceased to 
be an open question : it is done — deliberately and voluntarily 
done — and extension in that quarter is arrested by an insur- 
mountable barrier of national honor and justice. 

The striking features of incidental boundary are the ten de- 
grees of Pacific coast, which, uniting with the Oregon shore, 
make a sea line of over twelve hundred miles. Several con- 
siderations give to this immense value, in my judgment. 

In the first place, it secures us against any conterminous rival 
in the rear, or between our interior population and the vast 
Southern Ocean. Our citizens, migrating to the farthest west, 
incur no hazard of encountering a foreign hostility, and our 
national treasury need be little appealed to for their protection. 
Had an ambitious and commercial colony been planted, by an 



28 

European monarchy, with its trading and naval rendezvous, at 
San Francisco, or San Diego, it is easy to perceive the checks 
and embarrassments to which their prosperous growth must 
have been subjected. 

In the next place, for the purposes of an active intercourse 
with the rich Orientals, nothing can surpass this magnificent 
front upon their great highway. The world never has wit- 
nessed a commerce like that which must circulate in, from, and 
over the Mississippi Valley, when steam, while uniting our 
eastern and western seaports, shall master the stormless and 
boundless waves of the Pacific. American agriculture and 
manufactures, with wide outlets on either hand, must send 
food, clothing, and comfort in all directions ; and our country 
become, as it were, a noble reservoir for streams of wealth re- 
turning from every land. Suppose, as a single illustration, 
that our freights of flour, corn, and pork, had as direct a path- 
way to three hundred millions of bug-eating and rat-relishing 
Chinese, as they have to the perishing Irish, we know, from a 
recent experience, in how salutary a manner we should be af- 
fected. This pathway I esteem one of the early and already 
ripening fruits of the treaty. 

Again : — My opinion always has been, and continues to be, 
that apart from the militia of the respective States, the regular 
and standing force of the nation should be vested where it is 
safest for the liberties of the people, to wit, in a navy. I do 
not believe that the sovereignty and rights of the several mem- 
bers of this Union can long survive the establishment of large 
armies under central control ; but your navy is just as harmless 
to your domestic institutions and polity, when in countless 
squadrons covering your coasts, or cheering your trade in 
every sea, as when creeping a few gun-boats in your bays and 



29 

rivers. Instead of constituting forts, garrisons and military 
armaments, spreading on a long frontier, or stationed in the 
midst of our citizens, alikq expensive and chafing, the pro- 
tecting power of the nation should be out of its limits, upon 
the two oceans ; unseen, but undoubted bulwarks against the 
respective continents of Europe and Asia. 

I have thus thrown together for you " rny thoughts on the 
Treaty of Peace.'' I intended to deal with several details 
more largely ; but perceiving that incidentally they have been 
touched upon, my conscience will not permit me to open on 
your patience a fresh succession of batteries. One topic, I dare 
say, as it is the rage of the season, you will be surprised to 
discern wholly absent. You doubtless think it naturally, if not 
inseparably, connected with the Treaty. I do not. Acquisi- 
tion or extension of territory is one thing — the after govern- 
ment of that territory is another. It manifests great sectional 
jealousy, or an inveterate distrust of the Constitution, to say 
that we cannot enlarge our limits without endangering the 
Union. Such a position partakes of the diseased prudence of 
a man who would reject wealth, under the apprehension that 
its inheritance might cause controversy among his children ; or, 
more aptly still, it squares with the philosophy of one who re- 
treats from all female society, lest he should prove an unfaith- 
ful husband. Entertaining no such sentiment, not having in 
politics eaten of " the insane root which takes the reason pri- 
soner," I have deemed the matter wholly irrrelevant. Indeed, 
I believe you have heretofore had my views in relation to it, 
when the occasion was appropriate and direct. 
Always faithfully yours, 

G. M. DALLAS. 

lO^A October, 1848. 

To William White Chew, Esq., Germantown, Pa. 



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